The Prize has been awarded by Ms Maud de Boer Buquicchio, Deputy
Secretary General of the Council of Europe, and Mr Francisco Fonseca Morillo,
Director at the European Commission for freedom, security and justice at the
Conférence « Justice for ALL» which was held in Edinburgh, Scotland from 24 to
26 October.

The Council of Europe and the European Commission organised, for
the first time, in the framework of the 3rd issue of the European Day
of Civil Justice a competition to discover and highlight innovative and
efficient practices used in European courts for court organisation or for the
conduct of civil proceedings (for instance initiatives devised by a court
president, a registry, a Bar) and deserving to be drawn to the attention of
policy-makers and the judicial community so as to improve the operation of the
public system of civil justice..

22 entrieswere accepted from
courts or other bodies of judicial professionals in the member states of the
European Union or the Council of Europe according to the modalities of the
attached rules for the prize. These 22 entries , whose summaries have
been collected in a publication, constituing as many exemples of good practices
in courts organisation or for the implementation of civil judicial procedures.

The Jury met in Brussels on 4 October
2005 and decided to honour 7 projects,
among which 3 have been shortlisted to compete for the Crystal Scales of Justice
and invited to submit their projects in Edinburgh.

Finally it was the project submitted by Courts in the
jurisdiction of the Court of Appeal of
Rovaniemi in Finland which won the award.